Tuesday, October 6th
...thinking the Residents would be showing up this morning I went scanning early...scanned at place one and then on to the next...etc...
...something unusual happened...it was flat calm...should be able to see whales for miles...but so far I had seen nothing...
...then I heard what I thought was a blow (exhale) from an orca...but I couldn't find the whale...this went on for maybe 10 minutes...one blow every so often...but it was so faint that by the time it reached my ears the whale would have been under the surface...
..."keep looking"...I wasn't leaving until I found this whale!...finally!...the binoculars and the whale met at the same moment - I saw a whale! (like you'd think it was the first time ever!)...
...only one whale?...hummm...that was unusual...the whale was maybe 3/4 mile offshore...and a few minutes later I spotted three more that were about a mile offshore...I was expecting to now find more but I didn't...
...the question: was it Residents or Transients?...that got answered quickly...they took a seal in the middle of a flock of birds...Ts it was!
...waiting and watching, hoping they would come up island...not expecting them to come much closer than a 1/2 mile offshore...but they had other ideas...
...another flock of birds...wonder if they will find a harbor seal down under...
...no meal in there...
...they kept coming...and moving in closer...
...am now at 'the wall' at Lime Kiln Pt. State Park...
...this is getting pretty interesting...3rd time in two weeks of having transient orcas on the shoreline at the park!
...and up island they continued...watching from each vantage point...then they went out of my sight and it was time to get to the harbor...
...out on Peregrine with Capt. Jim we met this group the T60s and T002B just north of the harbor...
...when you see the eyeball of a whale, even from your image..well, it's just special...
...some went around Battleship Island on the north side and T60D circumnavigated that little island...really!...they passed by the entrance to Roche Harbor...
...some went under someone's dock...and a paddle boarder was on the other side to 'greet' them!
...past Lonesome Cove Resort...
...around the corner and on down San Juan Channel...we left them at that point...they had taken multiple seals from when I first saw them until shortly before we departed...they might also have been taking some of their food along with them..
...these gulls wished they had left more scraps!
...but when I got off the boat I drove to the bottom of the island and got there just in time to see them, in the distance...they had almost circumnavigated the island today...what I wild day.
...and the Residents?...not today...no one saw them today...
Over the last few days:
Thursday, January 29th
...5:45 a.m. J pod, K pod, and a few L pod calls over the Lime Kiln hydrophones brought me to attention!...they sounded very clear, as if they were in Haro Strait, and were quite close...
...here's a sample of what I heard...Js are the loudest, Ks are a bit in the background - their kitten sound - and then a few up-tick L pod calls toward the end.
...the calls lasted for close to an hour...it was dark...and by daylight, as far as I know, no whales were seen, by anyone, anywhere, until...
...about 3:45 in the afternoon K pod calls began over the Port Townsend hydrophones...what was most interesting is that it was ONLY K pod...there were no J or L pod calls...
...now just where did J pod go?...and for the few, and only a few L pod calls that I heard, well they could very well have belonged to Onyx L-87...he more often has a different call, but I couldn't say which L pod whales were present other than him (most likely)...
Friday, January 30th
...figuring that K Pod had gone into Puget Sound, which was later confirmed, it was a wonder as to where J pod had gone...
...then I receive a call that whales are off the southern part of the island going down...off and running...
...it was the T60s and T02B...they have shown up several times since early December...
...five at the surface...there are five in the T60 family group, plus T02B who travels with them...they were off South Beach heading toward the Cattle Pt. lighthouse...
...up at the light as the whales were approaching, a California sea lion surfaced going up island...
...T60D, T60, T60C and T02B - in sync with one another...T60E and T60F were not at the surface...there was no fog here - yet - and wonderful morning sun...
...this was just an interesting set of their multiple foot prints...
...they had gone part way up into San Juan Channel when they disappeared into the fog...
Saturday, January 31st
...no news from anyone or anywhere...until late in the day...K pod was miles west of Victoria in the afternoon and they were heading west...I wonder if J pod went back out that way the other day or if they went north...
...where's their best chances of finding salmon?...that's where they will be...
Thursday, January 15th
...it seemed like it had been forever since...
...a whale! wow!...then another and another...I could tell they were Ts from their behavior...they were taking something to eat! When they are at that corner and then go out of view...down island? or just eating?
I chose down island - wrong!
...off to County Park...by now it had been 45 minutes since I had last seen them...but luckily the seas were calmer to the north than at Lime Kiln and I spotted a tall dorsal fin just as it was going down...they were north of County Park at least a mile offshore...
...I kept track of them, watching what looked like them making another kill, until I left to get on the boat with Dave Ellifrit of the Center for Whale Research...it was the T60s and T2B who travels with them...you can link to the Center for Whale Research encounters page for Dave's write up on the trip.
...back on December 4th I was out on Maya's Westside Charters and we saw the T60s...I never did post about it...it was the day that Rhapsody had died and things just got topsy-turvy.
...These images are from 12-4-14 and NOT from 1-15-15...
...when I saw T60 today while on CWR boat, she still had lots of pink in some of the gouges on her spinal ridge. I was surprised to see that...thought they would have healed more over the last several weeks...
...I had been recording over Lime Kiln hydrophones...having seen the locations of these whales and having a time stamp on what images I did get from shore, I checked when I got home to see if they had been 'talking'. I didn't expect to find anything and was surprised that I did. I assumed it was the T60s and T2B who were doing the 'talking' but didn't take the time to listen just then.
...Now just who was it who was there? These calls sound more like Residents than Transients...note: these were recorded over 1 1/2 hours so the calls are separated with a slight pause on this clip.
...I didn't hear any of the low tone sounds that I normally associate with Transients...you can hear them on my blog post of 4-5-14, they sound very different...
...did we have have some Residents in the distance and not know it?
or
...are these just what the T60s and T2B sound like?
Don't know the answer to that just yet...
note added 1-19-15: Residents, sounded like K pod whales, but where out there were they? !
Tuesday, September 16th
...Granny J-2 and Group A Minus were to the north...
...the J16s had been down island last I knew...
...and more whales had come in during the night...
...I barely got a glimpse of them from about a mile south of Lime Kiln Pt. State Park...and back down island they went...
...out on Maya's Westside Charters to see the....wait...what?...Ts? right here? - cool!
...it was the T60's again! just a few miles outside of Snug Harbor...and they were once again in eating mode...
...and when someone is surfacing backwards they usually are 'carrying' something - really...it makes them more buoyant!
...when she spyhopped she was really giving someone the eye!
...T002B has two tiny nicks...she was the 6th whale present and has been traveling with the T60s for the last few days...maybe all the time...
...when they began to move on so did we...the T18s were coming up island...geesh!...we were never going to see the Residents today!
...they were going the opposite direction as the Residents so we stayed with these whales...the seas to the south were getting rough...
...I know some special people in my life who live in a dome house in Alaska...I think of them every time I see this one...
...the T18s can be very sly when getting a meal...this afternoon they kept splitting into two pairs and then coming back together, which kept us on our toes!
...a quick look at Spieden Island on the way back...it's September and the animals are starting to show themselves more...
...always great to see these animals...
...by the end of the day the Residents who were down island had moved off shore and it sounded like they would soon be gone again...seems like there wasn't a lot of salmon that came in this last time...and that's not good...
...Group A Minus stayed to the north - like near the mouth of the Fraser River...does that tell us something or what?...it doesn't take a rocket scientist or even a scientist for that matter to figure it out!
...well tomorrow is another day and perhaps there will be more salmon showing up - fat chance...well...someone got this...wonderful, but I would have rather seen it in the mouth of a killer whale than hanging on a hook!
Monday, September 15th
...no sign of Granny and Group A, but the T60s were seen again...so off we went on Maya's Westside Charters to see what they were up to...especially after yesterday!
...nice group...and there was one other with them...T002B...
...I don't know if she is always with them or just some of the time...I've only seen them a few times...and this time I noticed that T60 had some tagging lumps on her...at least there wasn't any metal sticking out...
...I noticed T60F with a newish scratch...now these types of marks are naturally occurring from the way they live...the tagging marks are something that was done to them by humans...
...I noticed all these things because the whales became very active...it looked like a couple of the kids were getting in some hunting practice...and then later the adults came in and completed the meal preparation...
...while we were with the T60s group we got word that Group A had been seen out in the Strait of Juan de Fuca...so the mystery of who had been on the hydrophones at 11pm last night, remains just that a mystery...
...Granny J-2 and the other 12 whales of Group A were coming back in...but they took a very long time...
...when I got to the park and to the lighthouse and was sure the whales were coming up island, I heard some young ladies talking...and with what I heard I figured I better let them know that they were about to see whales...and when they did...well, need I say more!...always special when I get to hear/see people who are seeing killer whales in the wild for the first time...and especially the Southern Residents because many people have been adopters of these whales...sometimes they even get to see 'their' whale...
...but the J16s didn't come up...they stayed down island...
...a few other times this year the J16s have split off from Group A...remember when they were down by the Deception Pass bridge (post 8-13) when Granny was up at the Fraser...well no telling where the J16s will be tomorrow...
